Scotsman Politics: FMQs roundup Thursday November 21 2024

The Scotsman

Scotsman Politics: FMQs roundup

Transcript

00:00Hello, I'm Alistair Grant, the Scotsman's Political Editor, and I'm joined by Rachael

00:13Aimery, the Scotsman's Political Correspondent, and we're in the garden lobby of the Scottish

00:17Parliament just moments after the end of First Minister's Questions, in which Russell Finlay,

00:22the Scottish Tory leader, went in on this Auditor General report into the Scottish Government's

00:27finances, didn't he, Rachael? Very much making the point that the Auditor General had raised

00:30concerns about transparency, the Scottish Government's transparency, and kind of turning

00:35this into a wider political attack on the SNP Government. As Russell Finlay was saying,

00:42the chaotic SNP Government doesn't have a clue. John Swinney's saying that the Government's

00:46balanced the books. What did you make of that exchange?

00:49Yeah, clearly the Conservatives gearing up for the Scottish Budget, which is only going

00:53to go a few weeks away now. It comes on the 4th of December, and you can see both parties,

00:58both opposition parties, just manoeuvring and trying to get their narrative down nice

01:02and early. So that's clearly what Russell Finlay's tried to do here. Very interestingly

01:07though, it was quite an angry exchange at times. It has been quite calm since Russell

01:12Finlay became Scottish Conservative leader, but this one definitely was not at all. It

01:16was quite fiery. John Swinney in particular brought up a letter that had been sent between

01:22the two earlier this week about the Budget, and basically saying, how dare you come and

01:25question me on finances, basically. So it was quite a fiery exchange, which we haven't

01:29seen for quite a few weeks now in the First Minister's question, so it's quite interesting

01:32to see that.

01:33And I thought it was quite interesting as well that the Scottish Labour leader, Anna

01:36Sarwar, went in on an issue that you'd normally associate with the Tories, that's the early

01:40release of prisoners. People might remember that we've had, I think more than one actually,

01:46round of release of prisoners being released early to ease some of the overcrowding in

01:51Scotland's prisons. Anna Sarwar very much saying that the SNP is clearing up its own

01:56mess, making the point that the SNP has been in power in Scotland for 17 years, so they

02:01can't blame anyone else but themselves for this. He was pointing to a wider crisis in

02:05the courts, a crisis in legal aid, and saying that warnings have been ignored.

02:10Yes, this is normally something the Conservatives go in on, so quite unusual to see Labour trying

02:15to do this instead today. But yes, this is because an emergency bill is trying to go

02:20through Parliament now to try and release more prisoners in Scotland, to free up some

02:24space. It's been a long-going story for a few months now of just how little space there

02:29are in Scotland's prisons. But again, I think this is the Labour Party trying to set a narrative

02:34before the Budget, and also the long-term narrative of them ahead of the 2026 election,

02:39which has been going on for a few months now with the Labour Party. So again, I think that's

02:42sort of tactically trying to go for those two issues. But very interesting that it wasn't

02:47particularly finances or health that the Labour Party went on this week, so nicely something

02:51a bit different from Labour Party FMQs today.

02:53Yes, and again, very much political attacks on John Swinney heading back at the Labour

02:58Budget, what he calls austerity by the back door. But I wanted to raise as well Fergus

03:03Ewing, the SNP backbencher, a former SNP minister, raising the A9 and the ongoing problems. I

03:10wanted to talk about this because you have been doing a week-long series in the Scotsman

03:13that people can catch up with online as well as in today's paper. But essentially about

03:19the ongoing saga of the A9, the duelling of the A9, the delays we've seen around this,

03:23and Fergus Ewing making quite a powerful point today in the Scottish Parliament about the

03:27kind of rate of deaths, the kind of rate of danger that people are in on the A9. What

03:32did you make of that?

03:34Yes, of course, all this is on a backdrop of Tuesday, where there was another death

03:38on the A9, sadly, at the Ballinluig area, three more in hospital as well. The road was

03:43closed for about 10 hours, causing a lot of traffic chaos around the A9 area too. So that's

03:49sort of the context of this question that was asked today as well. Fergus Ewing was

03:55saying that those who are in a crash on a single carriageway are 10 times more likely

04:00to die or have a serious injury than those on a motorway, for example, and basically

04:05accusing the government of allowing Highlanders to be 10 times more susceptible to dying on

04:09this road because it's not duelled yet. No stranger to seeing Fergus Ewing getting quite

04:14angry about the A9 and questioning his own party on the A9, particularly on their record

04:18here. In fact, Fergus Ewing himself has helped us with this series. He's written his own

04:22column as well, the paper, which will be on our website, which viewers can see as well.

04:26So no stranger there. But yeah, again, another sort of quite angry exchange from the SNP

04:30backbencher towards his own party yet again.

04:32Yeah, I thought it was quite notable, just the emotion in Fergus Ewing's voice as he

04:37was asking that question. But I'm sure it's something that will run and run. And as I

04:40say, people can pick up a copy of the Scotsman, also go on to the Scotsman's website to see

04:45all the previous stories that Rachel's done on the A9. But that was First Minister's Questions

04:50in Holyrood on Thursday.

Category

Transcript

Recommended